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Ubuntu should adopt standardized usage of IEC binary prefixes (MiB, KiB, etc.) and SI decimal prefixes (MB, kB, etc.) throughout the most visible parts of the operating system.
When referring to sizes based on powers of two, software in Ubuntu should use IEC binary prefixes: KiB for 2^10 bytes, MiB for 2^20 bytes, GiB for 2^30 bytes, and so forth.
When referring to sizes based on powers of ten, software in Ubuntu should use SI decimal prefixes: kB for 10^3 bytes, MB for 10^6 bytes, GB for 10^9 bytes, and so forth.
Like most of us, I grew up writing "MB" and saying "megabyte" when I meant 2^20 bytes, and I expect I'll continue to use SI prefixes in conversation. In those days, the rate of error was minimal -- around 2.5% for kB vs KiB, and around 5% for MB vs MiB. As storage capacity continues to grow, and users deal with larger files, the error rate increases -- around 7% for GB vs GiB and a hefty 10% in the TB/TiB range.
Standardizing Ubuntu's description of data sizes using the IEC and SI prefixes will help to avoid ambiguity, and will also help to prevent the increasingly large errors that result from conflating the two prefix systems.
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